Drawing Design Recommendations

When creating DGN or DWG drawings it is recommended that the following conventions be followed:

• Use closed shapes for Tag Objects, that is, Instrument Bubbles.

• Best to include one tag value in each closed shape.

• Create objects to be hot spotted as a symbol (cell or block reference).

• Cloud shapes should be constructed as individual arcs so they are not considered by the Gateway as a single big object whose extent may cover other objects that need to be tagged separately. This will prevent erroneous tag capture.

• Do not replace vectorized object’s symbols by raster images because any text label or attributes which belonged to this symbol will be lost when converted to a raster image, that is, bitmap symbols cannot be properly tagged.

• Specifically for AutoCAD drawings:

  • If the Gateway extraction fails due to non-standard (native) DWG format. Try opening the DWG in AutoCAD and if it reports errors, use the Audit function which often cleans up the discrepant/non-standard objects. Resave the DWG before processing again with the Gateway.

  • If the DWG file contains custom/proxy objects they may not be extracted by the Gateway, resulting in missing graphics in the SVG and engineering information for parts represented by these custom/proxy objects. To process DWG files containing custom/proxy objects:

    • Save these drawings/models to the native AutoCAD DWG format. You can use an Object Enabler (program supplied by the creator of the objects), to read (open) these custom objects in AutoCAD. You can also use specific commands of the Object Enabler to convert the proxy objects to native objects before writing out to a new DWG file.

  • Supported versions: DWG and .DXF files up to version 2018 (version AC1032), produced by all versions of AutoCAD up to AutoCAD 2024

• Specifically for MicroStation drawings:

  • Scaling should be set to a ‘normal’ level so that when the file is opened in MicroStation it can be viewed without the need to zoom in. Scaling is adjusted by using the Active Scale Settings of the file.

    • In some drawings there are hidden objects that are positioned outside the main drawing, resulting in large overall extents, so that when the default view is ‘zoom to extents’ the drawing appears very small and so the SVG will also be displayed very small. In this case, open the DGN in MicroStation and fit the drawing's visible contents manually within the level view window or use the ‘Fit View’ button, so that all visible entities fit within the view. Re-save the file and reprocess with the Gateway.

  • Supported versions: DGN files produced by MicroStation V7, V8 XM (aka V8.9), V8i (aka V8.11)

  • Most V7 files can be processed without any issues, but if not then they should be opened in MicroStation and saved to a V8 copy.